The Date
by icecoldfunk
Summary: Before the end of the war the soon to be heroes of the world spent some time on the Fire Nation resort Ember Island. While historians generally considered it a bittersweet calm before the storm they were not privy to the whole story. Prequel to The Vist


[This isn't 'The Visit', it is however back story to 'The Visit' that i had fully intended to upload as a full standalone story. This has become impractical now as my new job has me away from my PC for weeks at a time and i leave in under 48 hours so there is no real way i'll have it done anytime soon. So this is the first part, I have not abandond my fic so don't worry, but at least until i can buy a laptop updates will be more sparse than even i am used to.  
Untill then i hope you enjoy;  
The Date.]

"Sokka, do you really think it's a good idea for us to attend a play about ourselves?"  
"C'mon, a day at the theatre? This is the kind of wacky time wasting nonsense I've been missing!"

……and for a while this is all we see, life doesn't go on till later in the evening, but life is an incredible thing, self replicating, self organizing (if only by creating more chaos [see; life and thermodynamics]), and alternating equally between the vile and the sublime, often within the same being, the point is, to quote a man wiser than I;  
"life gets everywhere it can, where it can't, it takes a little longer"  
Even in stories where strictly speaking life doesn't exist in the traditional sense at least, it will exist even if the life is only that which the story has taken on itself. The point is……

The point is….

The tree falling in the wood _does_ make a sound……

There _is_ more to heaven and earth than dreamed of in your philosophy……

Life, even in stories, _especially_ in stories, goes on.

"Time is not the only thing it'll waste Sokka, we're nearly out of food, again." she cast an accusing glare at her brother, but the truth of the matter was there were just more people now, more people training as hard as they could and they all needed to be fed.  
"And in case you have forgotten we're almost flat broke in fire nation money."  
"Uh.....no we're not." interjected Zuko.  
Sokka looked from his sister to Zuko and back again, doubt clouding his features.  
"How much do we have Katara?"  
Katara looked uncomfortable, she didn't really want to tell everyone that breakfast and lunch on ember island would be all the fruit they could find and dinner would be little more than rice for the foreseeable future, but it was Zuko who saved her.  
"We'll have enough, I have money, don't worry about it."  
Katara gave Zuko an odd look.  
"See?" Sokka got up and began pushing Katara and Zuko out of the courtyard. "Now go take the jerkbender and his wallet and go shopping."  
Sokka paused at that for a moment but shook the thought of shopping away, his girlfriend was warrior who on the first day she met him had beaten him up and then put him in a dress and make up, the last thing he needed was for Suki to see him going gaga over that red handbag with the gold trim that he saw in the shop window yesterday.

Zuko gave Sokka an irritated look, he'd helped bust the guy's dad and girlfriend out of prison, they were pretty much ok now, if not friends, but of all things did it have to be that name he latched onto?  
"I'll go get my wallet. Katara, I'll meet you outside."

When Zuko came out and gently shut the main gate Katara greeted him with a calm but confident expression as they walked to the Ember island shopping district.  
"So, what's the plan?"  
Normally even in the face of such an odd question Zuko's answer would have been short and to the point but there was something about her now that broke his mental stride

"Uh.......shopping?"  
They walked a little further.  
"Zuko, please, just tell me, I can help." The hurt in her voice was palpable, and this only confused Zuko more  
"Katara, we're just going shopping, what's wrong?" they stopped walking.  
"_Stop it Zuko!_"

Suddenly Katara was on the verge of tears but her voice was strong.

"Don't do this again! I couldn't take if you did. When you first joined, I...I looked through your things and I didn't find _any_ money, not one coin."  
She gave him an entreating expression as Zuko stood there, shocked to stillness until gradually some of the pieces began to fall into place.  
"You looked through my stuff? Wait, coin?......oh OH! You thought I was…..? _Now_ I see."  
He reached into his pocket and pulled out a thick leather envelope and opened it up.  
"Fire nation has paper money for the larger denominations, see?"  
He could tell that Katara didn't.  
"A few years back someone realized that since the value of a 'gold coin' was standardized and now had nothing to do with the metal in the coin so the treasury realized that the value of money was more of an abstract concept........uh.......what it comes down to is that each sheet of paper here is worth the equivalent 'gold coins' printed on it."  
It sounded weird and Katara realized that her brother would love the idea just from its inherent weirdness, but she still struggled to grasp the full scope of it.  
"So each one of those bits of paper-" Katara felt lightheaded, there were a LOT of bits of paper (a hundred if she remembered correctly), she had thought it was some sort of weird note pad at first. "-each one of those is worth the same as a gold coin?"  
"That's exactly it!" Zuko smiled proudly at her at the speed she picked it up, which also looked odd in of itself to Katara. "Well except one thing, I took it straight from the treasury and I wanted to be sure we would have enough, these are worth a hundred each-"

Katara woke slowly from a strange and frantic dream, she had been building a igloo out of paper and an oni, that looked an awful lot like a maniacally grinning Toph now that she thought about it, though that was a fairly common expression for the metalbender girl, kept on stealing the bricks.

There was a light breeze on her face, the sun was pleasantly warm on her skin, and the chair was comfortable, she stretched out her legs a little and sighed as she brought her arms up, only to meet resistance on one side. Katara opened her eyes and saw Zuko's concerned face inches from her own, once upon a time this was the stuff of nightmares (albeit some of the more confusing and _frustrating_ ones), this was not as concerning to her as realizing exactly what he had been fanning her with. Katara grabbed the money out of Zuko's hand and seeing nowhere else to put it, shoved it down his shirt and held it there with both hands. Zuko raised his eyebrow at this and it was only then that Katara realized what position they were in. Zuko had sat down on a log with her sitting sideways on his lap while holding her back and head up with one arm and fanning her with _ten thousand freaking gold coins_ worth of money with his other, and now with both of her hands pressed flat to his chest.

"OkIgottagetoffnow!" She squeaked.

"No." Zuko's voice was low and commanding, he pulled her legs tight up towards him, and after a moment he seemed to become self conscious of this. "Not until you're ok, you fainted there, and you're still looking a bit flushed."  
Katara squirmed awkwardly on Zuko's lap, trying to shift in his grip.

"I'm ok really, just let me get off."

Katara wondered exactly what it was that she said that got through to him because Zuko's pale face rapidly colored and he almost threw her off his lap. She looked back up the path and realized that they were barely 300 yards from the house, and with the way her heart was hammering Toph could probably hear it even from back there. Katara grabbed Zuko's hand and without warning ran the rest of the way to the markets with the thoughrougly confused firebender in tow.

They reached the markets far quicker than she had ever anticipated, this was mostly due to her own innate competitive streak, the prince of the fire nation was not one to be dragged along in the dust and he had quickly caught up to her with his long loping stride that ate up the distance at two steps for every three of hers. Panting and out of breath she was mildly infuriated to see that Zuko was barely even breathing hard, though after taking a glance at her his face colored and Katara felt a small conciliatory stab of victory, at least she got his blood pumping, with the run.

_No, wait, not victory.....side stitch.....ow ow ow!_

10 minutes later Katara was lying down on her back on a bench facing the fountain of the market square as Zuko trotted up to her with a paper cup of mango juice and shaved ice in each hand.

"What took you so long?"

"The beverage vendor couldn't break a hundred gold note."

Katara had to shade her eyes from the sun to give Zuko an appropriate look of incredulity.

"_Beverage vendor_?" she continued to until he finally began to look uncomfortable. "So, what did you end up doing? Oh yeah, and _gimmie_."

Katara sat up, took one of the mango juice cups and grinned impishly back at Zuko as he sat by her feet.

"I had to go to another store and buy something else first."

"Mmm? Like what?"

Zuko leaned back and sighed, eyes closed as if in deep thought, an utterly alien, for Zuko at least, expression of relaxation and contentment adorning his face which then transformed into an equally alien teasing smirk.

"Not telling."

"Oh _really_, and why is that?"

"Not telling that either."

"And is there _anything _I can do to change your mind?"

Zuko hesitated, while a technical virgin who hadn't even had the full sit down talk about sex since he was 10 where his tutors dryly informed him about the mechanics of reproduction in a way that was appealing as being told the mechanics of chopping fire wood. This was perhaps overshadowed somewhat by spending three of his formative years aboard a Fire Nation Royal Navy vessel in the company of his uncle's scrounged up crew who were without exception seasoned or brought back from retirement as a personal favor to Iroh. Be it from his earlier naive questions of 'what exactly is that tattoo?', to the conversations and bragging and telling of tales between crewmen that permeated the air just as surely as the coal smoke and even the drunken barely coherent, though well intentioned, rambling of his uncle as he had to be carried bodily or dragged by an underage and very sober Zuko back from the drunk tank of whatever town Iroh had decided required something more potent than jasmine tea. Put simply, without have even gotten to third base Zuko knew more about sex at least in theory than half the whores in Ba Sing Sei put together, so when Katara said _anything_, the re-banished prince's mind fizzed with possibilities.

"Uh...........nothing like that-" _yet_ added a dark and largly unexplored region of Zuko's personality.

"it's just that I've been here a few times, I know my way around pretty well and I'd like to show you."

Katara was dumbfounded, there seemed to be no limit to how much Zuko could surprise her anymore.

"You mean like a..." she struggled for an appropriate word as she tried not to fidget under the firebenders scrutiny "-an activity?"

Zuko blinked in confusion at the odd turn of phrase.

"Activity? Um, yes?"

Katara's confidence was bolstered by Zuko's confusion.

"Why _Prince_ Zuko, are you asking me, just little ole' _peasant_ Katara on a date?"

Because Zuko was, sometimes even to his own detriment, direct and honest his answer was not the blush and stammer response Katara had been expecting.

"Yes."

"Why?"

"I'll tell you if you say yes."

"That's blackmail."

"No, it's negotiation." Zuko said with a smirk that was far more frustrating and appealing than Katara would _ever_ admit to.

"Fine then, if it's a negotiation then I want more."

"Done."

"Uh......Zuko you don't even know what I want."

Had Zuko been more used to such a verbal tete a tete he may have argued that being male he likely never would, perhaps it is for the best that he didn't.

Katara watched as Zuko rubbed the back of his neck.

"I thought you meant in more general terms-"

"AHA! So you bought me something to break the note!"

Zuko looked crestfallen, he wondered despairingly why was it that girls could read him like an open book.


End file.
